Life and Fate Read Along, Part 1 Chapter 2

This post, covering Part 1, Chapter 2, is part of The Slavic Literature Pod’s chapter a day read along of Vasily Grossman’s Life and Fate. Learn more about our project here.

In this chapter, we zoom into the life of the camp and the people in it, as well as the many new types of criminals created by the Third Reich: 

"What Mostovskoy found most sinister of all was that National Socialism seemed so at home in the camp: rather than peering haughtily at the common people through a monocle, it talked and joked in their own language. It was down-to-earth and plebeian. And it had an excellent knowledge of the mind, language and soul of those it deprived of freedom," (p. 23).

This chapter is largely concerned with the many "new types" of criminals created by National Socialism: political opponents, intellectuals, emigres, enemy soldiers, even people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time.